


Kiss Me, Stranger

by jellybgood (JLee)



Category: White Collar
Genre: F/M, Implied Relationships, Multi, Romance, Threesome - F/M/M, Unrequited Love, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-03
Updated: 2011-10-03
Packaged: 2017-10-24 06:36:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/260229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JLee/pseuds/jellybgood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elizabeth wants a romantic holiday, and she gets it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kiss Me, Stranger

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mercilynn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercilynn/gifts).



> Written as part of the White Collar Valentine's Exchange on whitecollarfic 2010. The prompt was: "Elizabeth knows what she wants, now she just has to convince Peter and Neal."

It was the day that Elizabeth was supposed to spend with her husband. Valentine’s Day, despite being heavily commercialized and almost solely responsible for supporting the continued existence of both Hallmark and Weight Watchers, was still a day set aside out of the year for couples to be as affectionate in public as they wished. Elizabeth, personally, had been looking forward to a little PDA on a deserted street corner with a dimly lit light post.

Don’t judge her romantic fantasies; she likes those kinds of romantic scenes out of old Hollywood movies. Sometimes, like that day, she wished that Peter liked those movies too.

Neal watches those kinds of movies, she knows. She thinks that he liked those scenes just as much as she did. (And that he also wished that Peter were more romantically – and homosexually – inclined.)

That day, with thoughts and suppositions in her head, Elizabeth decided that she was going to indulge her romantic side, with or without her husband.

Neal was more than amenable to going out to dinner with her at a fancy restaurant uptown. It got him out of filling out boring reports with Peter, whom was equally agreeable to trading Neal for a guilt-free excuse from dinner and the always awkward ‘I forgot it was one of those days when I should’ve bought you a bouquet of roses at the very _least_.’

Neal came dressed in one of his spiffy, old-fashioned suits. He held doors open for her, complimented her shoes, and pulled out the chair for her at the table. They ordered expensive wine and flirted casually over the appetizer.

“You’re much better at this than Peter is,” said Elizabeth when the waiters came to change their salad plates for the main course.

“Holidays just aren’t the man’s strong point,” laughed Neal.

“Neither are birthdays or anniversaries,” she smiled. Brushing her hair back over her shoulder, she leaned forward and took a drink. “I would have left him ages ago if he weren’t so good in bed.” She winked at Neal.

He stifled another laugh and raised his own glass to his lips. “The truth is revealed; the real secret to the Burke’s happy marriage lies in the bedroom!” he joked. When he tilts his head back and takes a long, slow drink of wine that ever-so-slightly tints his lip a darker hue…

Yes, oh, most definitely, Elizabeth decided that more than just one fantasy needed to be fulfilled that night.

She waited until he’d finished his drink and they were waiting for their dessert. She begins with a subtle testing of the waters: “Do you have any plans for the rest of the night?”

“Nope, I’m all yours,” said Neal with the kind of smile that must have been one of the reasons he’d had such a successful criminal career.

“Wonderful. You’re about Peter’s size, right?”

“Ah, what do you mean?” Neal smiled and chuckled a little to recover from the odd change in subject.

“Well,” Elizabeth paused then as the waiter delivered a plate of cinnamon-flavored cake chocolate covered fruit, “if you’re going to spend the night, you can borrow Peter’s, unless it wouldn’t fit; we could stop to pick up your things.”

“Peter doesn’t like it when I come over, let alone sleep there,” said Neal, his expression a little bewildered but still open enough to easily be changed into one that could breeze off the entire conversation.

“Peter won’t mind; and you wouldn’t be sleeping, much,” said Elizabeth.

When Neal raised an eyebrow at her she quirked her lips, took a bite of a particularly big chocolate-dipped strawberry, and said: “Spend the night, with me.”

Neal now looked at her in blatant surprise.

“Peter—“

“He won’t mind,” Elizabeth repeated.

It only takes two more suggestive bites of cake and chocolate covered fruit for Neal to hesitantly agree.

\--

They forego the valet and walk up the street to get the car from the parking garage. They stop at a street corner to wait for the crosswalk to clear of cars. Standing under the light of the streetlamp, Elizabeth decides that it was the perfect moment and touches Neal’s elbow. He starts, he’d been a little twitchy since her bold proposition, and looks at her expectantly.

She said nothing, turning them so they faced each other. She drew his arms around her until he held her in a loose hug, and then pushed at his shoulders while simultaneously leaning back. He understood immediately what she was doing and dipped her halfway. Their faces were very close; his hair fell forward a little.

“Kiss me, stranger,” said Elizabeth in her best husky, Hollywood starlet voice.

Neal obliged, and it was deep and passionate and she swore that she heard the orchestra in the background.

He swept her back onto her feet and they stood for a moment, not quite out of breath but regarding each other with new feelings.

The light changed and a couple cars zoomed past, honking and whistling at them as they went by.

Elizabeth tucked her arm into the crook of Neal’s elbow and he led her by a half-step across the street in true gentlemanly fashion. As they stepped up onto the curb on the other side of the street, passing briefly under the next streetlight, Elizabeth leaned into him a bit and said in an undertone, “I definitely think you and Peter are the same size.”

Neal looked at her questioningly. In turn, she gestured below his waist where the old-fashioned cut of slacks failed to hide certain things. She had the pleasure of seeing him faintly blush under the dimmed streetlights, but she rather thought that it was from thoughts other than embarrassment.

\--

Peter came home late. He had been suspicious when he caught sight of Neal’s jacket in the closet. He was even more suspicious when he neither saw nor heard anything of him downstairs.

A quick glance into the guest room showed it to be empty.

Suspicion and a growing sense of anger developed inside of his chest as he approached the bedroom. He reminded himself that he should give Neal the benefit of the doubt. Really, Neal was more likely to be swiping the antique painting Elizabeth liked above their bed than to be doing something inappropriate to his wife.

He opened the door—

Elizabeth. Neal. In bed, with a bow and…

They twinkled their pretty blue eyes at him and smiled. Elizabeth wrapped her arms around Neal and that bow, and said, “Happy Valentine’s Day, honey.”


End file.
